TOGinator - 30 motor cluster - 6th flight

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delta22

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The TOGinator is being refurbished to fly again on a 30 motor cluster:
27x Estes D12
3x AT G64 White Lightning
800 Ns J cluster with onboard video

Going for its sixth flight Saturday, 11/19/11, at the CMASS launch in Amesbury, MA. Has fired 131 motors in the previous 5 flights.

Rocket has a fin design based on the FlisKits TOG, is 7ft tall x 4in diameter and flies at about 14lbs.

First 3 pictures show wear and tear from previous flights.

4th pic: Painted tail section with West 206 slow Epoxy tinted black and sanded. Done to repair, harden and color tail section in one step.

5th pic: Painted with second coat Epoxy, this time tinted black and thinned with 10% alcohol by weight.

Looks good from a distance of at least 10 feet as brushed on anything gloss shows many defects on a worn complex shape. Now has a harder surface than previously.

More info and previous flight pictures at www.bpasa.com

Will be fired with cluster box which will push about 110A at about 12V (1300W) to launch this. Powered by 14.8V 5Ah Lipo (4S 40C) battery, 200A Ford relay (triggered by a smaller relay to isolate from club launch system) and 10awg power leads. TRF thread: https://www.rocketryforum.com/showthread.php?t=11766

Original thread on TOGinator: https://www.rocketryforumarchive.com/...ight=toginator

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The TOGinator prepped with motors.

Used nearly a full roll of masking tape creating upper and lower (thrust) retention rings. Had to use more tape than previously as the short motor tubes "engine bikinis" have become sloppy with wear.

The upper body tube with flame graphic by Stickershock was originally used for the Hot Rod Nitro FireBall project from a couple years ago.

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The 30 Rocketflite igniters. All arranged in series strings 2 long, then connected in 15 parallel strings.

These had been prepped before the launch and cut to preferred lengths for various motors.

Igniters then wired to cluster box which dumped about 110A to fire it all instantly.

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The TOGinator lifted off quickly on a column of fire and smoke at 2:30pm on a sunny but windy Saturday.

All 30 motors fired. As D11-P motors are hard to get, used D12-0 engines. Many of the D12-0 motors burned at both ends creating the fireball effect at the tail of the rocket.

In the last picture can see five motors that were spit out by the rocket after their tape burned off.

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The rocket did a clean deployment on a 7ft chute after flying to 832ft.

There was a fair amount of scorching which will be repaired with more black tinted epoxy. Will need to add fiberglass in some areas that burned through.

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Hmm... Makes me consider a MicroMaxx TOG with 30 MicroMaxx engines.... I'm sure that I can shove them in there somewhere.

I'd have to draw inch marks (or cm marks for the non Americaners) on the rocket just so my photos wouldn't look like delta22's.

Someday, maybe.
 
Thanks.

Edited together video from 3 cameras:

[video=youtube;M-3dYlUGUyE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-3dYlUGUyE[/video]
 
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Nice flight Borris :). Personally I would of plugged the D12-0's. I would use epoxy, but "dog barf" and tape would work for those who feel pouring epoxy into it is "modifying" the motor. Do you think the BP motors on the top lit off the top of the D12's. Or was it the inferno of all the igniter juice? People tend to forget BP motors are "sparky" lol
 
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